Sep 06, 2011

A CSIRT Covering the Pacific Island Nations

"Bula" every one!! You will probably
find it easy to assume from the context that this word means “Hello”, but can
you guess what language it is?

It is Fijian.

Mr. Koichiro (Sparky)
Komiyama and I (Kaori Umemura), as the Japan International Cooperation Agency
(JICA) experts, were given the opportunity to visit Suva, the capital city of Fiji,
to support the preparation to kickoff the Pacific Islands Computer Emergency
Response Team (PacCERT), under the JICA's technical cooperation project "USP-JICA ICT for Human Development and Human Security Project".

The PacCERT
aims to be a trusted point of contact for information and Internet security
response affecting 22 Pacific Island countries. Their office will be located in
the Japan‐Pacific ICT
Centre in the University of the South Pacific (USP) in Suva.

Japan‐Pacific ICT Centre

During our
2-week visit in mid to late July, we had meetings with parties of interest to PacCERT
including the PacCERT Board chaired by USP, government officers, telco/ISP sector, banking
sector etc., to draw up the supporting plan on PacCERT operation. Through the
meetings with the parties, we learned that computer incidents in the region are
coming to the surface and reaffirmed the need of PacCERT.

Sparky delivered
a keynote speech entitled “Internet Security and Mission of PacCERT” at the Information
Security Session of SPICTEX 2011, the first of its kind in Fiji and the region,
and shared his views on the need of CSIRT and PacCERT. We believe that the speech
helped expand the awareness of PacCERT’s existence to its potential
constituency.

Sparky at the Podium

History
of PacCERT and its Partner Organizations

To briefly
review the PacCERT’s history, the necessity of CSIRT in the Pacific Island was first
advocated in 2007 by various groups in the region, including Pacific Islands
Chapter of the Internet Society (PICISOC). After the idea of establishing
PacCERT was endorsed by Pacific ICT Ministerial Forum 2009 held in Tonga, the Working Group and
the partner organizations (the Australian Department of Broadband,
Communications and the Digital Economy, AusCERT, ITU, IMPACT, JICA, JPCERT/CC, USP/Japan‐Pacific ICT Centre etc.) maintained close contact
for consultation. And in 2010, with an extensive contribution by ITU, AusCERT
and the Australian government, the PacCERT Business Plan was finalized and
approved.

With such continuous
efforts by the interested parties, the PacCERT will have their personnel and infrastructure
very soon. Following the well-conceived business plan, JPCERT/CC as the JICA
expert wishes to support PacCERT with what we are good at; to provide them with
the system setup support, technical training and outreach activity support until
the end of 2012.

A Flower Market in Suva

Challenges of PacCERT

The Pacific
Island nations are geographically dispersed and have large variances in
population size and Internet connectivity/penetration. There are only a handful
of other regional CSIRTs in the world and as far as we know, none of them are
operationally focused. This, combined with the large variations in population
of the Pacific Island nations that are involved, makes PacCERT a unique
situation.

In such a situation,
we believe it is important to “think big, start small and start now”. PacCERT
has already got their big goal in their business plan, so the next step is an
immediate start in a small scale. A limited number of services being successfully
delivered, will provide a strong foundation for the PacCERT and enable a smooth
transition into a full CSIRT operation.

As one of the partner
organizations of PacCERT, JPCERT/CC appreciates your close attention and
cooperation to this new regional CSIRT!